The invention belongs to the field of energy and chemical industry and discloses a preparation method and application of a copper/zirconia rod-like xerogel catalyst. The preparation method includes following steps: at room temperature, adding zirconium oxychloride octahydrage into anhydrous alcohol, and sufficiently stirring and mixing; adding copper salt into deionized water, stirring to be uniform, dropwise adding into a zirconium solution slowly, and stopping stirring after magnetic stirring reaction for 8-10h; dropwise adding epoxypropane into a mixed solution slowly, stirring for 3-5min, stopping stirring when sol is turbid, and waiting for gelatinization at room temperature; aging for 12h in air, and performing vacuum drying; calcining in the air, and feeding hydrogen-argon mixed gas for reduction to obtain the copper/zirconia rod-like xerogel catalyst. The preparation method is simple in process, low in production cost, low in requirement on equipment, pollution-free during synthesis, environment-friendly and suitable for industrial production. The catalyst can be used for catalytically reducing p-nitrophenol to prepare p-aminophenol, water is used as a solvent, and sodium borohydride is used as a hydrogen source, so that the catalyst is low in consumption, short in reaction time and high in conversion rate.